Russian missile strikes wipe out a third of Ukraine’s power plants

Russian missiles have destroyed a third of Ukraine’s power stations, President Zelensky said today as citizens were warned to brace for hardship this winter.

Zelensky said the damage had been done in only eight days and had led to “massive blackouts across the country”. On October 10, Russia launched its biggest salvo of missile attacks on Ukraine since the start of the war.

Russian rockets have hit Kyiv today, as well as Kharkiv in the north, Mykolaiv in the south and the central regions of Dnipro and Zhytomyr. Officials in Zhytomyr said hospitals were being powered by backup generators after missiles hit an energy facility.

Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian president’s office, said: “We have a critical situation throughout the country. One region depends on another. We must prepare throughout the country for the fact that there may be blackouts of electricity, as well as [problems with] water supplies and heat supplies.”

Kyiv said Tuesday that more than 1,100 towns and villages across Ukraine had been left without power after ten days of Russia strikes that have targeted energy facilities across the country. “For now, 1,162 settlements in Dnipropetrovsk, Kirovograd, Zhytomyr, Kharkiv, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya, Luhansk, Mykolaiv, Kherson regions remain cut off from electricity,” Oleksandr Khorunzhyi, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s emergency services, said during a briefing.

The Kyiv city prosecutor’s office said two people had been killed and another wounded in the attacks on the capital, and opened an investigation into a possible “violation of the laws and customs of war”.

Zelensky wrote on Telegram: “Ukraine is under fire by the occupiers. They continue to do what they do best — terrorise and kill civilians.”

The Russian defence ministry confirmed today that it was striking energy facilities in what appears to be a deliberate attempt to shatter the morale of ordinary Ukrainians. Many people in the war-torn areas live in partially destroyed homes that will provide scant protection during the winter, when temperatures can fall to minus 15C.

“Russian terrorists will try to use the cold as their weapon,” Denys Shmyhal, the Ukrainian prime minister, said recently. “In their sick imagination, Ukrainians sitting for several hours without electricity is a victory. They think that this way they will force us to surrender. This will not happen.”

He urged Ukrainians to cut peak demand by 25 per cent to reduce the strain on the power grid. Many people are stocking up on warm clothes, water, non-perishable foods, power banks, torches, batteries and candles.

The UK defence ministry said: “It is highly likely that a key objective of this strike campaign is to cause widespread damage to Ukraine’s energy distribution network. As Russia has suffered battlefield setbacks since August, it has highly likely gained a greater willingness to strike civilian infrastructure.”

At least one person died today when missiles hit a block of flats, a flower market and a park in Mykolaiv. Zelensky tweeted: “No space left for negotiations with Putin’s regime.”

Energoatom, the Ukrainian state nuclear energy company, accused Russian forces of “kidnapping” two senior staff from a nuclear plant in the occupied Zaporizhzhya region. Oleh Kostyukov and Oleh Oshek were taken yesterday, it said, adding: “Nothing is known of their whereabouts or condition.”

The Zaporizhzhya nuclear plant, the largest in Europe, provided about 20 per cent of Ukraine’s electricity before the war. Its six reactors were shut down weeks ago during fierce shelling in the region.

Evidence has also emerged of suspected Russian attacks on the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea last month. Underwater images published today showed that at least 50m of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline has been destroyed or buried under the seafloor. The damage is consistent with an explosion and is assumed to be sabotage.

Video from 80m down in the Baltic Sea, published by the Swedish newspaper Expressen, showed a massive tear in the pipeline.

Danish police said their preliminary investigation of damage to pipelines one and two in the Danish economic zone of the Baltic Sea indicated that the leaks were caused by “powerful explosions”.

The Danish findings echo the Swedish authorities’ announcement on October 6 that “pieces of evidence” collected from the two pipelines backed up suspicions of sabotage.

Trond Larsen, who piloted the submersible drone that captured the video, told Expressen: “It is only an extreme force that can bend metal that thick in the way we are seeing.”

The Ukrainian government and others have accused Russia of causing the damage to the pipelines at the end of last month, causing four leaks.

The Kremlin said today that the investigation into the explosions on the Nord Stream gas pipelines was being “tailored” to blame Moscow. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said: “From statements we hear from Germany, France and Denmark, this investigation is being a priori tailored to place blame on Russia. This is absurd.”

Moscow has accused western countries of being behind the explosions of the pipelines, built to carry Russian gas to Germany. “Russia would not blow up its own pipeline,” Peskov said.

The collapse in energy supplies from Russia has also forced Germany to grant a short stay of execution to its remaining nuclear reactors, which were supposed to be shut down by the end of the year. This week Olaf Scholz, the chancellor, issued an order for all three plants to be kept running until April 15 to keep the lower grid stable after bitter infighting in his ruling coalition.